Monday, 30 January 2017

Dear Colleagues, the call for contributions for the 15th Academic Practice and Technology (APT) conference "The future ain't what it used to be: inventing and re-imagining higher education practice" is open. The conference, co-hosted by the University of Greenwich and London School of Economics (LSE) takes place on July 4th 2017. We invite contributions from colleagues who are imagining and making the futures of higher education – colleagues who are pushing boundaries; evolving teaching and learning practices; developing new curricula; creating new collaborations or markets; analysing big data.

DEL (Digitally Engaged Learning) is an international conference exploring and evolving digitally engaged teaching and learning in art and design Higher Education.We welcome submissions from individuals and groups across all creative disciplines, working in roles including instructors, lecturers, researchers, artists and designers, support staff, instructional designers and technicians.

Themed 'Teaching Making / Making Teaching', DEL 2017 seeks to explore digitally engaged practices and processes of teaching, making and researching within the creative disciplines.

By 'digitally engaged', we are referring to practices that are actively with, about or in digital tools and spaces. We take the creative disciplines to refer to a wide range of areas including (but not limited to) art, design, media, performing arts and music. We understand teaching, making and researching as uncertain 'crafts' that involve processes of self-discovery, experimentation, enquiry, reflexivity and development.

This year we have not defined conference tracks. We hope this encourages submissions that resonate with the overall conference theme, but that make sense in the context of the many disciplines and practices participants may be coming from.

There are a number of submission formats, designed to accommodate participants at different stages and places in their digitally engaged teaching and learning journeys. You can propose any of the following:

From curriculum innovation to internationalisation, this conference aims to disseminate best practice and allow for knowledge exchange on important key themes, relevant to teaching and learning provision within the university sector.

The themes for the conference are focused on six key areas and based on research from across and between disciplines:

Thursday, 19 January 2017

The HEA’s Transforming Assessment in Higher Education symposia series aims to bring together cutting edge examples of effective efforts at sustainable and manageable change at programme, school/faculty/college and/or institutional-level with regards to assessment and feedback. Specifically, the one-day symposia series aligns with the themes emerging from the national HEA summit for Transforming Assessment in Higher Education (May, 2016), namely challenges pertaining to:

Tuesday, 17 January 2017

The next in our series of Teaching and Learning Conversations (TLC) will take place on Tuesday the 31st January 2017, 12-1pm, with Prof. Norman Jackson, Founder of Lifewide Education and Creative Academic.

Norman’s TLC will explore with colleagues the Ecology of Teaching & Learning in Higher Education and we really hope you will be able to join this opportunity with us.

Simply follow this link http://mmu.adobeconnect.com/tlc/ and enter as a guest by typing your name, institution and country into the name field and clicking on the “Join Meeting” button.

Whether or not you have previously participated in a webinar or online activity using Adobe Connect we advise that you make sure that you do some checking and preparation in advance. Check your set-up and connection here.

Tom Stafford is Senior Lecturer in Psychology and Cognitive Science at the University of Sheffield. He is also the department's Director of Public Engagement. His research focusses on learning and decision making, and how they interact.

Over my years working as a teacher in university I have applied insights from the cognitive science of learning and decision making to my teaching practice via hopeful experimentation on the courses I have taught. My ambition has been to use the literature on the role of feedback and active learning, in combination with new technology, to solve the dilemmas of delivering effective tutoring to larger classes. In this lecture, I reflect upon what worked and upon what didn't, and I talk about what cognitive science has to offer teachers and teaching in universities.

The Educational Development Unit open lecture series is free to attend

The 15th annual international conference on e-Assessment and computer supported assessment and qualifications, the e-Assessment Question Conference and Exhibition, will look at how we can deliver robust, reliable and cost effective e-Assessment in world of

Both days will look at the broad spectrum of innovative e-assessment from assessment for learning and formative assessment in the classroom and the workplace, to digital delivery of high stakes qualifications, to the use of technology to support and enhance assessment, qualifications and certification - developing robust, reliable and cost-effective solutions to support learners, teachers and institutions. Delegates can attend for one day or both.

Bookings may be made for either day or both days of the event, with a discount for Charities, Schools, Colleges, Universities and those in the public sector.

This year also marks the introduction by the e-Assessment Association of the first e-Assessment Awards which will be announced at a gala dinner to be held on the evening of the 22nd March 2017. Delegates to the conference can optionally book their place at the dinner when booking for the conference.

We trust you or one of your colleagues will be able to join us for what will certainly prove to be an invaluable and thought-provoking event .

Friday, 13 January 2017

Reacting to the 'Hard to Reach' Through Student Engagement Initiatives

FREE REGISTRATION FOR STAFF ENRDS ON MONDAY 16th JAN!

Dear all,

The REACT project will be disseminating their work at the REACT Conference on Tuesday 2nd May 2017 at the University of Winchester and would be delighted to invite you and your colleagues to attend. The conference will include presentations from all 16 institutions involved in the REACT Collaborative Development Programme from across the UK focused on engaging 'hard-to-reach' students. This event aims to celebrate the work of all involved in REACT, disseminating best practice and research findings to students, academic staff and other stakeholders of the Higher Education community. The conference is open to delegates from all institutions across the Higher Education sector internationally with an interest in Student Engagement and/or engaging ‘hard-to-reach’ students.

Just a quick reminder that the submission deadlines are this week for both the UKAT Annual Conference, and the NACADA International Conference.

UK Advising and Tutoring -

Making a Difference to Student Success – Inspiring Students Through Advising and Personal Tutoring

5-6 April 2017, Leeds Trinity University, Leeds

Submission Deadline: 12th January

Proposals are still welcomeon the theme of Advising and Personal Tutoring for Success, Attainment and Retention, with a particular focus on the impact that personal tutoring and academic advising can have on the differential attainment of students from diverse backgrounds, and strategies for supporting students to achieve academic and future goals.

The Future of Academic Advising: Connecting and Consolidating Students' Experiences and Education.

10-13 July 2017, University of Sheffield

Submission Deadline: 13th January

UKAT is pleased to support the NACADA International Conference and has reached an agreement with NACADA that any proposals submitted for the UKAT conference can also be submitted for consideration for the NACADA International Conference in Sheffield. It is permitted, and positively encouraged, to submit the same proposal to both conferences. Further information available via the following links.

It would be highly appreciated if you could publish this upcoming event EDULEARN17 in your institutional or departmental website. We are sure that it will be very interesting for professionals in the area of Education, Research, Innovation and New Learning Technologies.

After 9 years, EDULEARN has become an annual meeting point for lecturers, researchers, professors, educational scientists and technologists. Every year, EDULEARN brings together over 700 delegates from 80 different countries.

It will provide the ideal opportunity to present your projects and experiences to an international audience. Also, it will offer participants an overview of the current situation of education and new learning technologies.

EDULEARN17 Proceedings will be reviewed for their inclusion in the ISI Conference Proceedings Citation Index (Web of Science). Previous editions are already indexed. Also, a DOI number will be assigned to each accepted paper.

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Please send abstracts to Rachel by noon on 13th February for consideration for this session: r.brooks@surrey.ac.uk

Many scholars have argued that, in contemporary society, higher education policy and practice have both been profoundly changed by globalising pressures. Indeed, some have contended that the state’s capacity to control education has been significantly limited by the growth of both international organisations and transnational companies (Ball, 2007) and that the three traditional models of university education in Europe (Humboldtian, Napoleonic and Anglo-Saxon) have been replaced by a single Anglo-American model, characterised by, inter alia, competition, marketisation, decentralisation and a focus on entrepreneurial activity. Nevertheless, this analysis is not universally held. For example, not all European nations have sought to establish elite universities or maximise revenue through attracting international students, and significant differences remain in the way in which higher education is funded. In explaining such variations, scholars have pointed to differences in political dynamics, politico-administrative structures and intellectual traditions, as well as the flexibility and mutability of neo-liberal ideas themselves. However, research to date has focussed primarily on the extent of convergence (or divergence) with respect to top-level policies; as a result, little work has explored the perspectives of social actors, nor the ways in which policy may be ‘enacted’ locally, in ways that diverge from formal policy documents.

In this session we intend to bring together papers that explore the ways in which ‘the higher education student’ is constructed across different spatial contexts. We are keen to include papers that draw on data derived from students themselves, as well as from other social actors (such as the media, policymakers and higher education staff). We anticipate that they will speak to debates about what it means to be a young person within the contemporary university, as well as to those that relate more specifically to the geographies of higher education.

Rachel Brooks

Professor of Sociology and Executive Editor, British Journal of Sociology of Education